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One of the points I stress in my book, Kick-ass Copywriting in 10 Easy Steps
Ad #1 Copy Reads: “Superfect. The E-Class Coupe. It deserves a whole new language.”
Ad #2 Copy Reads: “Fabuttractive. The E-Class Coupe. It deserves a whole new language.”
The problems with this copy are two-fold:
First, how many Mercedes customers would be motivated by the pre-teen, Valley Girl (okay, I’m dating myself there) language used in this copy? Who is the target audience for these ads? How many of them would be positively influenced by the word “superfect” or “fabuttastic”? And would they want to be associated with a product and brand that is linked to those words? It’s doubtful.
Second, the glaring inclusion of ‘butt’ within the word ‘fabuttastic’ is hard not to notice. It’s almost laughable and is a great example of another point I make in my book – always show your copy to many people before you approve it. While the creative team behind this ad may not have noticed the word-within-a-word subliminal message, many advertising critics have. I don’t think many brands like Mercedes want to see the word ‘butt’ in such close proximity to their products and brands.
I’m just saying.
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Susan Gunelius
Susan Gunelius is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc. and Founder & Editor in Chief of an award-winning blog, WomenOnBusiness.com. She is a 25-year veteran of the marketing field and has authored 10 books about marketing, branding, and social media, including the highly popular 30-Minute Social Media Marketing, Content Marketing for Dummies, Blogging All-in-One for Dummies and Kick-ass Copywriting in 10 Easy Steps. Susan’s marketing-related content can be found on Entrepreneur.com, Forbes.com, MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, and more. Susan is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She has worked in corporate marketing roles and through client relationships with AT&T, HSBC, Citibank, Intuit, The New York Times, Cox Communications, and many more large and small companies around the world. Susan also speaks about marketing, branding and social media at events around the world and is frequently interviewed by television, online, radio, and print media organizations about these topics. She holds an MBA in Management and Strategy and a Bachelor of Science degree in Marketing.
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I’m wondering if this campaign was influenced heavily by Mercedes in Germany. The reason: where we work (yip, in Germany), we’ve seen this idea a lot recently. It seems to be a German thing. Merging words, sometimes painfully, to be unique.
We dismissed it in localisation projects as the play on words usually doesn’t work in another language. The German clients didn’t like our feedback, though. They like the “cleverness” of the copy. Maybe it appeals to the local sense of humour. Or it’s the latest German advertising agency trend?
Whatever’s happening here, I agree with your assessment of this Mercedes ad for the States! It’s NOT target market.
The BUTT issue is one I’d not seen though – but I’m a Brit so it doesn’t count.
Thought: maybe Mercedes didn’t check the ad with people from your side of the Atlantic!
I completely agree with your take on “Fabuttractive.” You can’t miss the “butt” and to some of us, it even looks like “fat butt.”
I think they were possibly channeling the (successful) Farvigneugin campaign (or whatever that word was for the driving excitement you get from Volkswagen!) and as the poster above pointed out, it seems to be a German thing, with the way their language is constructed.
I disagree with you on the “Superfect” part though— I sort of liked that– It conjures up “superb, superlative, super, perfect” and I think it kind of works. The “fabuttractive” (not fabtastic) right on its heels though, makes it less workable.
I like your blog, and your style!
I think you’re right, Alex. The ‘cool’ thing to do in copywriting these days is merging words. It’s already boring though. 🙂
Eve, thanks so much! I’m glad you like my blog. I agree that ‘superfect’ is definately better than ‘fabuttractive’, but I can’t help but thinking it’s a word high school girls would use and respond to, not Mercedes customers. I’d imagine a 14-year old ten years ago saying, “Oh my gosh, the Backstreet Boys are superfect,” but I can’t imagine a Mercedes customer walking into the showroom and saying, “that Mercedes E-class is superfect.” It seems like a copywriting disconnect. By the way, I didn’t see the ‘fat butt’, but that’s hilarious and makes it that much worse!
Amazing, isn’t it, how a single small detail can make the entire campaign subject to harsh criticism. All they had to do was delete one of the t’s to avert the whole “fat butt” controversy.
I have to say though, in defense of the campaign’s overall theme, MB knows that it must continue to appeal to younger, hipper consumers – the ones that love BMW’s.
It’s true, Steve, the extra “t” is what made it “butt,” but it’s also necessary to the (I assume) root word “attractive.”
So, all in all…a dog.
Ooops—forgot why I was replying…which is to say, Steve Smith, I agree that their whole ad slant was to appeal to a hipper audience, which is laudable, but don’t they actually know any 30-somethings they could run their new slogans by?
Haven’t they ever heard of Urban Dictionary?
(It’s not all gangsta thug-ho talk–some of it’s really clever and fresh.)